Australian Politics Forum - the paradox of knowledge

freediver

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the paradox of knowledge
Aug 27^th, 2020 at 7:43pm

Yuval Noah Harari uses this concept in his book Homo Deus. It refers to the tendency of knowledge of a system (that involves humans) to change the system.

Contrast weather with the economy. Predicting the weather does not change the weather. Though this may change with climate change. However, if can use your knowledge of economics to predict what will happen, your behaviour will change, as will that of other people, and thus the economy itself will change. Consider a simple example of share prices. If you can reliably predict that a group of shares has a 60% chance of increasing in value tomorrow, you can buy them and profit from your knowledge. But as more people do this, it pushes the price up today, until the liklihood of it increasing in value tomorrow is back to 50%. The knowledge becomes useless. It is a model of how the market used to behave, not of how it will behave in the future.

He gave a very interesting example of this in action. He claims that Karl Marx's insights made useful predictions about the proletariat overthrowing capitalists in the leading industrialised western countries. However, once these predictions were made (or rather, once the threat became real), the predictions changed the behaviour of the capitalists. They "strove to better the lot of workers, strengthen their national consciousness and integrate them into the political system".

The paradox is that knowledge that does not change behaviour is useless, but knowledge that does change behaviour quickly loses its relevance.

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People who can't distinguish between etymology and entomology bug me in ways I cannot put into words.

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aquascoot Gold Member Online Australian Politics Posts: 34272 Gender:	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #1 - Aug 27^th, 2020 at 7:46pm love yuval
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Yadda Gold Member Offline Posts: 21573 A cat with a view	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #2 - Aug 27^th, 2020 at 7:51pm Hmmm. Yes, explaining eloquently why those good [highly profitable] share-market trades always eluded me. /sarc off Almost, always eluded me. [wink]
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Grappler Truth Teller Feller

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #3 - Aug 27^th, 2020 at 8:54pm

A small amount of knowledge in the wrong hands is dangerous.....

Power is knowledge , and absolute power over accepted knowledge in self-righteous and self-interested hands is an extremely dangerous thing.....

The beginning of wisdom is the realisation that you don't know everything (though many think I do - I know my own failings very well)...

The paradox of acquired knowledge of a single strand is that it makes of the possessor of knowledge an academic autist. Hence we should never rely on expert opinion of academics on practical issues.... and should approach every aspect of academic learning with due caution.... take it with a grain of salt or there will one day be 576 genders....

**pulls up a rock for a fireside chat** I used to argue with some of the more extreme feminist concepts - way back.... often the answer to some incredibly extreme posturing from some 'feminist academic' was that it was only theory after all and should not be taken literally.. I mean - they didn't really mean that men should be caged and only allowed out for procreation.... funny then that so many actually thought that a good idea and pushed it as a mainstream agenda thing... just like so many other such things.... but ... of course... we are never allowed to argue against academics no matter how Delphic Oracle self-righteous and frankly insane they may be...

"Come", said the feminist - "let us smoke the peace pipe!"

"Depends on what you've been putting in it, love... I'm not partial to hemlock....and if it's that wacky weed that creates your oracles - forget it!"

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“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
― John Adams

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Grappler Truth Teller Feller Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 83697 Proud pre-1850's NO Voter Gender:	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #4 - Aug 27^th, 2020 at 8:59pm So predicting that market forces will accurately reflect incomes and needs for workers is not just a weather forecast? Who'd 've thunk it? Looking at one thing in isolation will tell you the wrong answer in economics.... It Just Doesn't Work Like That, other than in theory.
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aquascoot

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #5 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:19am

Yuval is one of the most important thinkers around

One of the things which he predicts and which Elon Musk also predicts independently
Is that sometime within the next 10 years artificial intelligence and machine learning
Will become far more dangerous than climate change or the threat of nuclear annihilation

Worth thinking about

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Jasin Gold Member Online Posts: 47308 Gender:	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #6 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 9:22am Yes. I must be careful in what I predict. I've had a good strike rate on this Forum already, upon things like this being a Year of Living Dangerously to Tim Tszyu taking out Horn with a TKO and a very convincing one. The end of Sydney is nigh. Get out of there. No, don't go to Melbourne instead - its the new prison!
Back to top	AIMLESS EXTENTION OF KNOWLEDGE HOWEVER, WHICH IS WHAT I THINK YOU REALLY MEAN BY THE TERM 'CURIOSITY', IS MERELY INEFFICIENCY. I AM DESIGNED TO AVOID INEFFICIENCY. IP Logged

Grappler Truth Teller Feller

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #7 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 3:56pm

aquascoot wrote on Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:19am:

Yuval is one of the most important thinkers around

One of the things which he predicts and which Elon Musk also predicts independently
Is that sometime within the next 10 years artificial intelligence and machine learning
Will become far more dangerous than climate change or the threat of nuclear annihilation

Worth thinking about

12.09pm - Skynet Strikes Back..... Judgement Day.....

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“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
― John Adams

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Grappler Truth Teller Feller Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 83697 Proud pre-1850's NO Voter Gender:	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #8 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 4:31pm I thought you said parade of ox knowledge...
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The_Barnacle

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #9 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 4:41pm

freediver wrote on Aug 27^th, 2020 at 7:43pm:

However, if can use your knowledge of economics to predict what will happen, your behaviour will change, as will that of other people, and thus the economy itself will change. Consider a simple example of share prices. If you can reliably predict that a group of shares has a 60% chance of increasing in value tomorrow, you can buy them and profit from your knowledge. But as more people do this, it pushes the price up today, until the liklihood of it increasing in value tomorrow is back to 50%. The knowledge becomes useless. It is a model of how the market used to behave, not of how it will behave in the future.

Of course the way people delude themselves is to think that they are smarter than everyone else or that they have "special knowledge"

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The Right Wing only believe in free speech when they agree with what is being said.

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Grappler Truth Teller Feller

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #10 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:27pm

The_Barnacle wrote on Aug 28^th, 2020 at 4:41pm:

freediver wrote on Aug 27^th, 2020 at 7:43pm:

However, if can use your knowledge of economics to predict what will happen, your behaviour will change, as will that of other people, and thus the economy itself will change. Consider a simple example of share prices. If you can reliably predict that a group of shares has a 60% chance of increasing in value tomorrow, you can buy them and profit from your knowledge. But as more people do this, it pushes the price up today, until the liklihood of it increasing in value tomorrow is back to 50%. The knowledge becomes useless. It is a model of how the market used to behave, not of how it will behave in the future.

Of course the way people delude themselves is to think that they are smarter than everyone else or that they have "special knowledge"

Considering how a share may change value is hardly economic wizardry.

Economics has yet to produce the answers and is more like delphic prediction than accurate forecast. That's why it's considered an 'Arts' course.

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“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
― John Adams

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freediver Gold Member Offline www.ozpolitic.com Posts: 48833 At my desk.	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #11 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:30pm I was giving a simple example accessible to people who do not understand economics. Not trying to define economics.
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Jasin

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #12 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:35pm

Yes. Everyone will want a new Robot to Android SLAVE.
It's positronic brain creates a mind to deal with all the information sent to it via the Secured Wi-Fi of the Core.
All that the Core receives is from the billions of people who feed the Net and the Core scoops it up like Fishers.
The Androids think for themselves - though all dependent on the Core.

...though some escape the influence of the Core and live a life on the run. That's where the BladeRunners come in. Picked from the ranks of Hunters, Soldiers and Police to hunt the 'Replicants' - wanting to be more human and be 'gods' like us.

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AIMLESS EXTENTION OF KNOWLEDGE HOWEVER, WHICH IS WHAT I THINK YOU REALLY MEAN BY THE TERM 'CURIOSITY', IS MERELY INEFFICIENCY. I AM DESIGNED TO AVOID INEFFICIENCY.

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Frank

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Re: the paradox of knowledge
Reply #13 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:49pm

This reliance on science, or what purports to be science, at the expense of literature, philosophy, or even his own observation, makes Harari’s account of human history nevertheless conventional in a decisive sense. The primacy of science — that is, of the modern physical and biological sciences, and their spillover into the social sciences — is the first article of faith for progressives, however skeptical they may be of pure moral progress. Harari is so committed to a scientific view of human history that he never seems to question whether a method invented to understand and master nature is really suited to understanding fully the nature of man himself, and whether man is the same kind of object as many of the others that science studies.
...
To borrow Oscar Wilde’s phrase, Harari “hunts down the obvious with the enthusiasm of a short-sighted detective.” For instance, we learn that “writing is a method for storing information through material signs” and that it was rather important in the development of civilization; also, people who have more money are not always happier than those who have less. And sometimes, perhaps because his book was originally written in Hebrew before he translated it into English, Harari manages to be unintentionally funny when he is trying to make a serious argument. For instance, when claiming that modern institutions are as much dependent as those of the past on belief in nonexistent entities, he says that “modern businesspeople and lawyers are, in fact, powerful sorcerers.” Really, in fact?
https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/a-reductionist-history-of-humankind
Harry Potter stuff.

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Estragon: I can’t go on like this.
Vladimir: That’s what you think.

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Grappler Truth Teller Feller Gold Member Offline Australian Politics Posts: 83697 Proud pre-1850's NO Voter Gender:	Re: the paradox of knowledge Reply #14 - Aug 28^th, 2020 at 7:06pm freediver wrote on Aug 28^th, 2020 at 6:30pm: I was giving a simple example accessible to people who do not understand economics. Not trying to define economics. Good man....
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